Broncos using last year's disappointment as fuel in 2014

ENGLEWOOD, Colo. — On the first official day of the Denver Broncos' 2014 offseason program, quarterback Peyton Manning and his coach spent the day not reveling in his MVP-caliber play in 2013, but rehashing the moments from last season that didn't go so well.

That included watching game film of Manning's interceptions, sacks and other bad plays.

"You break it down into very specific parts of the season, and you study kind of what went wrong and why those happened and what you could have done better," Manning said Monday after the team's first offseason conditioning session. "I think as soon as you say, 'Well, hey, I don't have to do that this year — I'll just skip that part,' that is cheating yourself, that is cheating the team, and it means you're probably not going to be as good a quarterback as you need to be."

So no, the Broncos haven't let go of the disappointing end to last season — a 43-8 blowout loss to the Seattle Seahawks in the Super Bowl — and even the new players who weren't part of that team can feel it.

Though Manning said the new additions — guys like pass rusher, DeMarcus Ware, cornerback Aqib Talib and receiver Emmanuel Sanders among them — don't care that the Broncos didn't win the Super Bowl, Ware disagreed.

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"You have to let that be the motivating factor for this offseason," Ware said. "You can really see that the guys really want it, and they know that they have that bad tastes in their mouths from last season. I know that is motivating them."

The Broncos are currently focused on weightlifting and conditioning. Players from opposite sides of the ball will cross paths occasionally, but these first few weeks are more time for each unit to get to work together.

For Ware, that means extensive time with outside linebacker Von Miller, who is continuing to rehabilitate from January surgery on his reconstructed anterior cruciate ligament. Miller joined his teammates for upper-body and core strength work on Monday, in addition to film work, Ware said.

"Some of the moves he was doing on tape were some of the moves that I have been doing. I was critiquing him, he was critiquing me, and it's just good to know that there are guys out there that look up to you," Ware said.

Ware is coming off the worst of his nine seasons spent with the Dallas Cowboys, with only six sacks in 13 games as he was limited by an elbow injury. It was the first time in his career that Ware did not play a full season.

Miller, too, struggled in 2013, a season that started with a six-game suspension and ended in Week 16 with the torn ACL. He had only five sacks in nine games.

But Ware, who said he is "94%" healthy now, is already imagining what he and Miller can do together when both are back at full strength.

"Playing defensive end, you always get a lot of the grunt work, especially when it comes to pass rush and getting double-teams. But if he comes back where he needs to be, you can't double-team both of us," Ware said.